A long felt need in the art of vehicle vision systems, such as rear-view systems, has been to provide an operator of a vehicle with wide angle scenic information of an area around the vehicle, such as directly rearward of the vehicle, when the vehicle is traveling in reverse. Neither interior rear-view mirrors nor side exterior mirrors allow for visibility of the area immediately rearward of the vehicle's bumper, which is the information most critical to the vehicle operator when backing up. Therefore, various camera-based rear view vision systems have been proposed to provide visibility of this blind spot.
It is also known to provide a graphic overlay on the displayed image of the rearward scene to enhance the driver's perception of the rearward field of view. Examples of such graphic overlays are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,670,935; 5,949,331; 6,222,447 and 6,611,202, which are hereby incorporated herein by reference in their entireties.
Various camera-based rear vision systems for vehicles backing up have been proposed. In one form of these systems, a camera with a conventional, standard lens is located on the rearward portion of the vehicle to provide a view of the area behind the vehicle. However, standard lenses fail to capture a wide angle view of the area, thus failing to provide the vehicle operator with an image of the entire critical area directly rearward of the vehicle. In order to provide a wider angle view of the rearward area, a wide angle lens system may be used with the camera to capture the critical area. Examples of such systems are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,922,292; 6,757,109; 6,717,610; 6,590,719 and 6,201,642, which are hereby incorporated herein by reference in their entireties.